Zardon

Let me address you directly as you seem to be ignoring my posts and referring to us in the third person as some kind of evil faceless coorporation. The point you are making is that you feel the fact we used XP 64bit is not 'representative' of the XP user base, right? It is perhaps correct that a much larger portion of the XP user base used 32bit windows, but this is not a misleading article. This is still windows XP and we listed the fact that all the operating systems in the article are the 64bit versions. This is on the test list page in clear text - therefore you can certainly state that you don't agree we used it, but you can hardly make the statement that we are misleading anyone. Perhaps if we had posted "Windows XP 32 bit V Vista 64 bit V Windows 7 64 bit" then it would be misleading, but its not and we didn't.

This is a comparison of all 64bit versions of Windows in recent years, that being 64bit XP, 64 bit Vista and 64 bit Windows 7 - I would assume that a huge portion of our user base now are using 4 GB of ram and 32bit just doesn't cut it anymore and hasn't for quite a while. The reasons for using a 64bit OS across the board are to show how the gaming experiences on these operating systems have changed for the end user base since they were released, with Windows 7 still to be offically released.

You could actually argue that XP has had many more refinements with SP updates when in fact Windows 7 is still classed as a pre release candidate. Without a 64bit OS in all the testing the apples to apples in this article would never have been applicable - you would end up with less memory and you would be running a totally different kernel. I understand your point that you feel 32bit XP is a more "viable' testing platform as it was a larger user base however you are missing the point of the article and that was to show the evolution of Microsofts operating systems on as close a level playing field as possible. You could argue many other points, such as that Windows XP 32bit actually ran Farcry worse than the 64bit XP OS because of the specially implemented 64bit version - I know from posts on our forum that a lot of XP users made the switch at that time (even before memory was an issue). You could argue that we used Vista SP2 when in fact some say SP1 is faster. It is really simple - we used all the 64bit Operating systems with all the patches applied for fully up to date and equal testing methods.

Firstly you can refer to me or Veridian3, rather than 'they' - we are not a faceless corporation out to mislead end users. If you feel it was a waste of time then that is your view and you are free to air it in our forums (as you have done) - I appreciate your opinion on the results however I think you have made your point quite a few times and I tried to address it earlier and you seem to be insinuating that we have some hidden agenda which I can assure you we don't.

If we had used windows XP 32bit and then 64bit versions of the other operating systems, I feel it would have been a grapefruit to apples comparison, rather than an apples to apples configuration. We tried to keep variables to an absolute minimum by using one high end system with as little cpu limiting as possible and keeping the 64 bit OS across the board with all the same games. If you feel its not representative of what you need then all I can do is apologise for not taking more time by adding 32bit XP testing into the mix. We have quite a lot of work on right now so we had to keep the article to a specific time frame.

Actually I don't think it is - this is why most people are moving to 64bit operating systems now - they are the future for a variety of reasons. Not only with the greater accessible memory but with enhanced processor states. This is massively relevant in todays enthusiast marketplace.

Again - I am unsure of your focus on XP 32 bit - none of the operating systems were listed in the 'title' in regards to the specifics - we don't have enough room in a header to start listing all this - they are however clearly listed on the test system page which is an important part of all our articles. You found it, so im pretty sure almost everyone else did. remember we also didn't list the 32 or 64 bit state of Vista of Windows 7 either and a huge portion of the Vista userbase used 32bit. You can't be selective in stating we are misleading people when in fact we have used identical listings and hardware throughout all the testing. If you think logically about this - you are in fact being biased by hand selecting XP as not having a 32 or 64 bit moniker in the article header when in fact none of them have the moniker. All of this, including our testing methodology is listed in detail on a specific page in all our articles.

I had a complaint today actually that we should not be testing Windows 7 64bit until its released as it is unfair to be comparing a yet officially released platform against an OS which has had multiple SP releases (both XP and Vista to this point with SP3 and SP2 respectfully).

My conclusion?

You really can't please everyone and we really don't have the time to spend several months covering every permutation of operating system with multiple system builds. All I can say is that our testing is accurate so you can take from it what you will. If, in your case you are assuming we are out to mislead people then I will categorically state that this is incorrect, if I didn't care or found your attitude hostile (which many other admins would), all your posts would be deleted and you would already be removed from the site. I do however find all these opinions important and hopefully you understand the points im making rather than coming back again with hostile third party accusations and calls of foul play.

YnHDaRkMaN

XP users, wanna game the way it's meant to?
Upgrade your OS

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macbiter

not sure I would have spent all that time zardon educating the little twerp. people are so rude on forums im surprised you even acknowledged him in such a polite manner.

I will say something - I used XP 32 bit for 6 years and I still have it on one of my computers for a semi home server (and tv based gaming machine), it has a 4870 in it which is perhaps slightly overkill. I upgraded the memory recently from 2gb to 4gb and I decided to install XP 64bit to keep the overhead low but the memory count high.

You know what? there is absolutely chuff all difference now with gaming performance between 32bit and 64bit XP - i used fraps and noticed NO DIFFERENCE. These arseflaps need kicked out because its fine having OS 'loyalty' but its not fine accusing the people who run this great site of being corrupt. that is utter crap and annoys the hell out of me.

temeteus82

Are you 100% sure about the driver support?? I mean that I just did a bit googling and found that all the major gfx makers and chipset makers still got drivers, update ones, to Windows XP 64-bit.

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LukeK

Driver support is fine for XP 64bit - I still use it and it is now a brilliant operating system. it was not initially mind you so I understand where this guy is coming from. That said he needs to get with the times as the changes now make it a fully viable platform. I never liked Vista 64bit when I tried it and I haven't had the chance to try Windows 7 yet. I still think XP is great, but I will give 7 a shot later this year when I get time.

Very useful article DH, I can't say gaming is my number one priority but it was very benefical to me. I loathe some of the ludicrous XP user fanbase however, its ridiculous some of the nonsense I have read on many sites (and in forums).

Veridian3

Just to put this 32 vs 64 debate to bed once and for all, I found some time today to run a quick test on 32bit XP to compare to 64bit.

In Lost Planet the 2 OS's tied on Avg and Max FPS with 64bit edging it on Minimum FPS.

In WIC it was a very convincing win for 64bit on average and minimum FPS and a tie on max FPS.

I would expect the trend to be similar throughout the other games which tells us that 1) XP 64 appears a better choice than 32 for gaming and 2) The testing in the review shows XP in a fair and comparable way.

BlueMak

You know...perhaps I shouldn't be annoyed but I am. Perhaps you faceless corp (DH...) should just put a 1-2GB (that's the usual ammount for 32bit XP users) RAM system XP32 and shove the results down some peoples' throats. Would that be a more fair test Drazula? Let's see how many records that XP32 will break. *insert sarcasm smiley.

Unless, what Drazula tries to say is that Vista and 7 are treated unfairly because from the XP versions you picked the best with the far more RAM than the VAST majority of XP users will ever have.
In that case, I am sorry.

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The people who are regarded as moral luminaries are those who forego ordinary pleasures themselves and find compensation in interfering with the pleasures of others(Bertrand Russell)"You go into Afghanistan, you got guys who slap women around for five years because they didn't wear a veil,You know, guys like that ain't got no manhood left anyway. So it's a hell of a lot of fun to shoot them." - Lt. Gen. James N. Mattis
This is slavery, not to speak one's thought. [Euripides-The Phoenician Women (c.411-409 B.C.)] http://www.macedonia.info/FALLACIESANDFACTS.htm Sic semper tyrannis.

Judas

Dune 2 doesn't even work under xp without thoroughly screwign around with it.

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Judas

hmmm i found win vista/ win7 runs generally considerably better on them..

I still prefer the vista sp2 32bit install on my Intel P3 733mhz 1gb ram system... it runs very well


btw i find it utterly halarious that anyone would bring xp 32bit into this.. considering the fact that vista's coming onto it's 3rd year of availability soon and win7 is launch not to mention Windows XP 64bit has been available for over 5 freaking years.

I haven't used a 32bit OS since........ actually since i had a 32bit cpu ... barton 2500+ i beleive was my last 32bit CPU........ ah.. back in the golden age of 6 years ago.

ok.....

So i've been building machines for the last 9 years for various people and have been using Window XP 64bit on those machines since 2005.

YES driver support was a bit sour in a few departments, but provided with the right hardware, no one has had any issues.

Actually i don't know of anyone locally or any friends that i have that use anything other then 64bit IF they are familare with it.

XP64 is by far WAY FASTER in a considerable number of things vs xp32..so i also think the grandma vs UFC champ is a bit of a joke, might be accurate though.... cause i would put xp64 as grandma and xp32 as 6 feet under.

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SeraphicSorcerer

Windows 7 Performance is greater then I expected, and even the system responsiveness is noticeably faster, ctrl-alt-delete is instant, which I expected for a looong time.

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blibbax

Good article (despite the masses of nonsensical criticism above).

As a few others have said it'd be interesting to see how the results scale to slower systems, especially those with fewer cores. Overall, I'm very glad to see how favourably Vista compares. I really don't think it deserves all of the abuse that it gets.

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RE III - Frankie

I found that a faster card on XP is slower than a comparably slower card on 7. eg; 4870 on XP < GTS250 on 7.

BETA911

Good article, really good showed how the differences are...